urge parliamentary scrutiny of the state within a state of the Khakis, especially the dreaded spy agency (DGFI). The interference of the Khakis into state politics will once again jeopardize institutionalization of elective democracy, good governance and secularism. The rogues fear social justice activists, critics, politicians and journalists too - Joy Manush!

Thursday, November 28, 2013

The Queenmaker of Bangladesh

TAHMIMA ANAM

Call Bangladesh the land of the
resurrected. Here, a dictator can be overthrown, disgraced and imprisoned, and
still make a comeback.

More than two decades after
being ousted, Hussain Mohammed Ershad is now being called the “Queenmaker.”
Thanks to recent political maneuvering, he is in a prime position to tip the
scales between the two main contenders in the general election to be held in
January: Sheikh Hasina, the prime minister, and Khaleda Zia, former prime
minister, leader of the opposition and Ms. Hasina’s longtime foe.

Mr. Ershad came to power in
1983, as the head of a military-backed government. By late 1990, after nearly a
decade without free and fair elections, a massive popular uprising — led by the
two most powerful opposition parties, the Awami League (Ms. Hasina’s party) and
the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (Ms. Zia’s) — was putting pressure on Mr.
Ershad to step down. His government fell after the army withdrew its support.
Within weeks, Mr. Ershad was in jail on corruption charges.

More than 20 years later,
Mr. Ershad’s influence is on the rise again. Though Ms. Hasina and Ms. Zia once
cooperated in the movement to restore democracy, they have become bitter
opponents in the intervening years, as power has shifted back and forth between
the Awami League and the B.N.P. Now, on the eve of another election, Mr. Ershad
is the accidental arbiter in the enduring rivalry between the co-architects of
his downfall.

Bangladesh is deeply divided. Ms.
Hasina’s record in many areas — development, infrastructure, health care, the
trial of war criminals from the 1971 liberation war — boasts important
victories, and those go far beyond anything Ms. Zia achieved when she was prime
minister, in 1991-1996 and 2001-2006.

But Ms. Hasina’s decision
to stand by allegedly corrupt ministers and her consistent repression of her
political opponents have damaged her standing. Especially controversial, Ms.
Hasina has scrapped the so-called caretaker government that had overseen
national elections since Mr. Ershad’s fall. In its place she has appointed a
special election-time cabinet formally open to all parties and placed herself
at its helm.

Ms. Zia looks even worse.
Her last term in office was marred by allegations of corruption (some involving
her immediate family), and she reigned over an unprecedented spate of violence
by religious extremists, including the Islamic terrorist Bangla Bhai. While in
the opposition, Ms. Zia has been obstinately uncooperative. She has boycotted
Parliament since losing the election in 2008. Now she is threatening to boycott
the January election unless the caretaker framework is reinstated. In the
meantime, she has called a series of strikes and demonstrations that have
brought the country to a standstill. She has refused to join Ms. Hasina’s
interim cabinet.

Mr. Ershad, for his part,
has accepted to join the new cabinet. He has also agreed to run in the
election, a move that will lend the process the credibility that Ms. Hasina
badly wants and Ms. Zia is trying to deny her. And if Ms. Zia does stick to her
boycott, the Jatiya Party of Mr. Ershad will likely become the country’s new
main opposition party, vastly increasing its current influence.

And
so it is that while the two leading ladies of Bangladeshi politics quarrel, Mr.
Ershad’s clout is growing. In fact, it is almost tempting to forget the dark
spots in his past. Mr. Ershad’s rule is sometimes looked upon as a dictatorship
of the benign sort. The 1982 coup that brought him to power was bloodless
(conveniently, his predecessor had already been assassinated). And the years of
democracy that have followed his downfall have been tainted by so much
corruption, cronyism and repression that his regime can seem innocuous by
comparison.

But nostalgia
underestimates the damage the man did to Bangladesh. Mr. Ershad
institutionalized corruption on a large scale, undertaking building projects
that enriched him and his cronies. In 1988, his government amended the
Constitution, ignoring its foundational secular principles to declare Islam the
country’s state religion. The return to politics of this dictator, whose fall
was so hard-won, sends a message of impunity.

Democracy in Bangladesh has
taken another hit, in other words. Politicians are unaccountable. The electoral
process is sketchy. Yes, Bangladeshis have held on to the right to vote, but it
is, in effect, the right to vote only for warring factions determined to
destroy each other.

A few weeks ago, in a bid
to convince her to end the strikes, Ms. Hasina made a telephone call to Ms.
Zia. The transcript of the conversation, which was circulated online, reads
like a parody.

Ms. Hasina: “We don’t want
to quarrel.”

Ms. Zia: “You are quarrelling.”

Ms. Hasina: “You are the
only one doing the talking. You are not allowing me to talk.”

Ms. Zia: “Why would I do
that? You are asking questions, I am replying.”